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Ironic met iconic and The Club took the L. The Reds thought they had Grady Sizemore, but he chose the Red Sox. Last night, he banged a double off the base of the Monster, off the unreliable L. Ondrusek in the 12th. Momentum, stopped dead.

I'm hesitant to already label 2014 Just One of Those Years. I'll wait for the Chapman-Latos cavalry to come and stay for a month or so before that call is made. Besides, Looie is at .500 and the Brewers have lost 5 of 7. But treading water for five weeks is no way to chase a championship.

The season after 32 games still seems as if it hasn't started yet. It's an unopened package on Dec. 26. Part of that is injuries. Part of it is inconsistent offense. Some of it is just the way this team looks, some of the time.

· IT WAS COOL listening to The Famer reminisce about 1975, the Series, and how Sparky had his team enter Fenway in such a fashion that the first thing his players saw was the Monster. As if to say, "There it is, you've seen it, don't aim at it.''

· IT IS COOL having MLB At-Bat, partly because it allows you to listen to other broadcasters. Jon Miller of the Giants is in The Famer's league when it comes to calling a game and keeping it light. He was discussing Pittsburgh's downtown renaissance last night, when he offered, "I think I'm in Bruges,'' which happens to be an Old World, fairy-tale pretty city in Belgium. A little sarcasm makes the play-by-play go down easier.

· I WAS PLEASANTLY SURPRISED at the reaction to my feelings re Fenway and Wrigley, expressed in This Space yesterday, and in today's TM column. It's not that they aren't cool places to visit. They are. I just wouldn't want to live there, so to speak.

There is a reason the Cubs want to pour $500 million into renovations, and that Fenway already has been somewhat redone. People now care more about amenities than charm. The NF of L gets this. Lambeau Field might be an icon, but it looks very little like it did even 15 years ago. I haven't heard anyone complaining.

Soldier Field was redone. It looks horrible, but that hasn't hurt attendance. The NFL didn't care about nostalgia or memories when it helped the Bengals hijack this community. It cared about money. Today's stadia are all about lux boxes, wide concourses, lots of bathrooms, easy in-out concession stands and convenient, if pricey, parking. Fenway and Wrigley are museums. Nobody plays sports in the Smithsonian.

· I LOVE REPLAY. MPWS benefited from a walk-off replay W last night. Here's the video. In the bottom of the 9th, game tied 1-1, S.Marte hit a fly off the top of the RF wall. He slid headfirst into 3rd, the throw got away, was backed up nicely. Marte slid headfirst again, into home, where he was called out. The replay showed clearly that his hand beat B.Posey's tag. Ballgame.

Frequent perusers of This Space know my feelings re replay. But I will admit that in game-defining situations such as this one, it's probably worth keeping. And I'd say that if the call had benefited SF, too, so shut up youse.

· WITH THE 24TH PICK IN THE FIRST ROUND. . . The Enquirer's Paul Dehner Jr. says The Men will take OSU LB R. Shazier. I sort of understand this. And I sort of don't. For a few years now, the Bengals have been in the good spot of being able to take Best Available, rather than Need. If they think adding another dynamic outside LB, to tandem with Beast Burfict – who then could lead the team in tackles again, from his natural MLB spot – then OK. But LB is not a position The Men need to help. Not with Burfict, Maualuga, Lemur and Rey.

One of these years, T. Newman will start showing his age, more clearly than he has already. A. Jones is best suited as a third corner, and who knows how L. Hall will return from a 2nd blown Achilles. D.Kirkpatrick is a flower in need of a hothouse. If the Bengals have a Need, it's there.

Regardless, the intrigue won't happen until Friday, at Pick 55, barring any trades. QB or not QB? That is the question.

· AND FWIW. . . If you didn't see Dehner's stuff over the weekend – on why the Bengals have done well with a small personnel department – it's truly a must read. I miss Grumpy Joe, but our new guy is every bit as thorough, and writes very well.

· A DAY AT THE HOMEPLACE is never without surprises. Yesterday, it was watching a flock (a pack, a group, a mess?) of wild turkeys walk in semi-formation across the woods about 100 yards down the hill. Lucy The Wonder Dog was asleep, so she had no idea. The turkeys took their time, single-filing through the pines and cedars. Awesome.

· I'M NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE. . . The Man isn't an avid book gobbler. I read one at spring training in AwesomeYear, ironically titled The Good Rain, sort of a history of the Pacific Northwest's abundant natural resources, and how we've fouled them. (Hey, it was more interesting than I'm making it sound.)

But when I find something I truly love, I can't wait to pick it up and don't want to put it down. As I get closer to the end, I read more slowly, hoping to extend the feeling as long as possible.

That's why it took me half an hour to read the last three pages of All That Is, a novel I bought for no particular reason when I was in Spokane with UC. I loved this book, about a man successful in all things but the thing that matters most: Love, deep and abiding.

"All That Is" gobbles the whole arc of a man's lifetime as its subject, opening near the end of World War II, when Philip Bowman is a junior naval officer on a ship bound for Japan. Over the next several decades, we see him married and divorced, and watch him make his way as a book editor at a literary publishing house in New York. Other romances follow, the most significant one curdled by a cruel betrayal that Bowman ultimately repays with commensurate viciousness. Friends fall away, new friendships are forged, houses are bought and sold, parents die, and one by one the bonds of love and attachment weaken and fade. In one of our last glimpses of Bowman — he's just old enough to be thinking hard about death — he's pondering a trip back to the Pacific, last seen from a warship's deck, "where the only daring part of his life lay."

We sometimes see ourselves in the books we prize. Bowman is an affable loner. He mixes easily in party-crowds, but does his best self one on one. He is curious, he loves to travel. He longs for a lasting emotional attachment; it's forever just out of his reach. He has trouble defining his role as a good man.

Good fiction uplifts and inspires. TML is sketching the outline of a novel now. I spent the day yesterday in the country sunshine, reading and scribbling, duly inspired. Anyway, All That Is. James Salter. TML sez ckitout.

1. The Prince of Tides. The last great book from the master of self-absorbed angst, Pat Conroy. Comes very close to being overwrought, but never crosses that line. It's just a beautiful story about growing up in the ravages of a doomed family.

2. East of Eden. Steinbeck's best storytelling. Simple, journalistic prose, no pretense. Better than Grapes of Wrath which to me, tended to read like social commentary.

3. Big 2-Hearted River. A Hemingway short story, profound in its simplicity, about a psychologically wounded soldier, back from the war, seeking his balance in Michigan's north woods. Timeless. A reason my son the book editor became entranced with the written word, way back when.

· AND FINALLY… Not denying climate change. Just found this line from a story yesterday interesting:

"Winters are generally shorter and warmer.''

Do tell.

· TUNE O' THE DAY. The Man was a big Doobie Brothers fan, but mainly pre-Michael McDonald. Nevertheless, this song has always hit me in the heart, way back when it first came out, just in time for my college girlfriend to dump me. Certain tunes forever resonate.